I think you guys are all going to love Sarah’s next transformation. I first thought of the idea to turn Sarah into a man at our last photo shoot. The whole crew, including Sarah was up for it. For those of you following the “Transforming Sarah” Series, you would agree that there is nothing masculine about her features, but like all the other looks– after hair, makeup, costumes and an amazing photographer, we pulled it off. Just in case you haven’t been following or can’t remember what our muse looks like before here is a photo.
As always Jonathan Cruz, our photographer, took step by step photos of the process for your amusement. In this case there was no need for an even complexion, so I skipped my usual first step of prepping the skin and preparing a clear canvas. The first step for this transformation was fitting Sarah for her beard.
Once I had the beard properly fitted on Sarah, I could secure it down with a special adhesive and I cut the beard down to an appropriate length and shape for her face.
It wasn’t too long into the transformation before Sarah was shocked to see how different she was starting to look. After her eyebrows were drawn in to give her a more masculine look, she gasped and said, “I look like my brother.” Jonathan quickly took a picture of her reaction.
Soon after, Trish Ay, our guest hairstylist started slicking back Sarah’s beautiful long blonde hair and pinned it back so it wouldn’t be noticable. Since light colored beards usually don’t grow in just one color, I decided to make the beard look more natural by coloring in parts of the hair. Sarah was really starting to look like a man, but I felt her skin still looked too youthful and beautiful. So in order to age her and give her rougher look, I added some age spots and wrinkles, then darken around her eyes to make them look sunken in and less feminine.
Meanwhile our very talented costume stylist, Sara Rakhshandeh was busy picking out the perfect costumes for our model. Unfortunately our model’s body just wasn’t masculine enough, so Sara Rakhshandeh realized that the one thing this man was missing was broad shoulders. This was no problem as our costume stylist improvised by stuffing some socks for padding under her shirt. Once the Sarah changed into her costume and a few accessories were added– the difference was shocking. Ms. Smyth had turned into to Mr. Smyth.
Here our a few photos including the before and after of the this incredibly fun shoot.
Sarah Before
Sarah as "Steve"
We recently added a new addition to our crew, Dan Ax has been filming the process for us and has put together a video that I think will make you chuckle. Take a look at this
Remember if you have any suggestions for our Transforming Sarah Series please leave your comments. We are up for any challenge. We hope you enjoyed following along with this shoot as much as we enjoyed doing it. Stay tuned for Sarah’s next transformation were we turn her into a pin up model.
Photography by www.JonathanCruz.com
Film by Dan Ax
Costumes by Sara Rakhshandeh
Hair Design by Trish Ay
Makeup by Maria Rahmany
-Vancouver Makeup Artist
First our celebrity costume stylist Sara picked out the costumes for Sarah. Then, came hair and makeup. I always start by prepping the skin, so that I have a clear canvas to work with. I prefer using a foundation brush to apply the base because sponges tend to soak up the makeup and are not very enviromentally friendly. In this case I used Bed Head #2 fat-free (cream base) and Estee Lauder #2 concealer under the eyes.
We had a time crunch, so as usual we double-teamed on the hair and makeup. Sarah just sat back and watched herself transform. Trish put black and purple extensions in Sarah’s hair to give her some length and some edge. I chose to do a dark black heavy smokey eye on Sarah give her that dramatic cat-eye effect. After about one hour of makeup, back-combing, teasing, hair extensions and lashes….Voila… Sarah looked like a whole new girl.
For Sarah’s smokey eye I used Elizabeth Arden “Smoke” on Sarah’s eyelids and Mac “Carbon” around the entire frame of her eyes. I lined the rim of her eyes with Lancome “black coal” liner and applied false lashes. To counterbalance Sarah’s dramatic eyes I chose to give her a pale lip with Revlon “Nude” lipstick and a clear gloss to finish the look. 
We decided for our first shoot with Sarah we would go back to the 1920’s. The first step in transformation is picking out a few costumes for Sara, which were donated by celebrity costume stylist Sara Rakhshandeh. Once the costumes, accessories and shoes were all carefully chosen, we started the next step in the transformation–Hair and makeup. First, we started by prepping the skin and hair.
Jonathan and I had a very clear vision of how we thought this 1920’s girl should look. What could be more 1920’s than the classic finger wave hair style? Trish Ay was the hair stylist and she had a big job ahead of her, since the finger wave may be one of the hardest hairstyles to achieve. All the while, Jonathan was snapping pictures for all of you to be able to see and enjoy the step by step process as we enjoyed every moment of it. Here is a great photo of the beginning stage of the finger wave. 
We originally decided to use Sarah as our muse because of her simple and classic beauty, but realized how much easier it is to work with someone who is so professional. We had a time crunch and had to get things moving, so Trish and I double teamed hair and makeup to get things moving. Sarah was a trooper and just sat back as an observer, just quietly watching herself being transformed. Jonathan was still busy taking pictures for our readers to be able to follow.
Now it was time for a few test shots by Jonathan, but Sarah was a bit nervous on how to pose since she is an actress and not a professional model. We had to bring in an expert on this kind of thing, so to show Sarah how to pose we brought a visitor. It was Sofia, Jonathan’s adorable little girl and Sofia showed Sarah how it’s done. Take a look at this. 
